An entry from my journal dated  November 2, 2007

REMINISCES…

Its been a long time since I have connected soul with ink and paper, experience with reflection. A very long time indeed…..I feel the need to dwell deeper into my life, to search for greater depths …..just like I used to 3 years ago……

8 th August 2004. The day I started to write ” Dear Diary…..” , clutching the blank pages of a book close to me, enscribing it in my journey through life with my tears and laughter till the barren indifference of the white pages were coloured with the shades of my life and I stared in disbelief at the reflection of my soul which no mirror could have ever revealed to me.

I leaf through the pages of my diary, reminiscing the days of my college years. 4 years that were the longest in the history of my travails and the shortest in the chronicles of ecstacy and happiness. Crossing the threshold of my hostel, 4 years ago, I paused instinctively at the door of my small room, freshly painted with yellow distemper, breathing in the possiblities and experiences that wafted in the ambience, my mind drawing caricatures on its walls, filling the emptiness with music and claiming the space as mine.

My imagination and ambition had found a home and my eyes welled in gratitude as I watched the sky though the grilled windows.I only remember the sky….it would seem from my description that that was all there was to see through my window but you couldn’t have been more misled by my description. My hostel warden’s balcony loomed ominously and dominated almost the whole of the view. It was only a mouthful of sky that dared to encroach and that was all that I needed to get heady………….

I miss those years of unshackled revelry in imagination and ambition, when my desires knew no bounds and I pursued all that my heart desired… running with the wind, splashing in the rain, lying on the muddy ground as the heavens cleansed my soul with its holy waters, music, theatre, dancing, sketching, painting…….and now……….here I am, in the land of opportunities…..devoid of my desire, inching my way up the ladder which everyone calls the ladder of success. Is it? Is money the only true measure of success ?Is fame and approval of people, the crown?…………………..I don’t know…………………..I am in a quandary…………I leaf through the pages of my diary to find what I feel I am losing…..my perception of life which I am now trading with people’s perception……it makes me more successful in the eyes of everyone but I cannot taste its sweetness………….